I know that I missed posting yesterday, not that I didn’t post yesterday but I didn’t post about yesterday, but it is ok I will cover yesterday and today in today’s post and then we will be all good :D. (man that sentence had a lot of the same words, it sure gets confusing when you are talking about the same thing). I will start with yesterday:
I didn’t go to bed as early as I had hoped to on Friday night, when I had posted that I was going to go to bed I did, I went to bed, but then I pulled out my book and read for awhile, but it was kind of nice- it is not very often that I just get to relax at night and read, when I could not keep my eyes open any longer I did finally go to bed. I generally wake up at about 7:30-7:45ish and I decided that because it was Saturday and I had nowhere to be I was going to sleep in a little bit, I set my alarm for 8:45 and I actually got up then ( I probably could have gone on sleeping for several more hours). I browsed on my computer for a little bit and then grabbed some toast to tide me over until Natalie and I went out for breakfast. Natalie was not up yet and so I decided that I would do some cleaning and organizing until she woke up, my first task was trying to move the mattresses around on my bed so that they would not fall off but they were too big for the way that I wanted to put them. I then also put stuff away that had been sitting out for awhile and needed put away. I was happy with the result, while I was in the kitchen filling up some water bottles Natalie came out of her room and she was all ready to go. She asked me if I was ready to go, all I needed to do was throw on some clothes and then I was ready to go.
While I was in my room getting dressed I guess that Sister Chu called Natalie and had many questions to ask her, because when I came out and went to Natalie’s door she was on the phone talking, I had to wait for like 5 more minutes before she got off the phone and so we could go. Of course when she got off the phone she wasn’t quite ready though so I had to wait for a little bit longer, finally at about 10:30 we headed off towards the triangle morning market to go and get breakfast. It wasn’t a very long bike ride there and luckily for us it was still open (normally when we ride by in the evening time it is closed so we were not quite sure when it would be closed). For my breakfast I had some dumplings (I am finding out that dumplings are kind of like a universal item and that you can have them for any meal- no matter where you go), they were ok but not my favorite dumplings that I have had since coming to Taiwan, I also had a roll kind of thing, I am also not sure if I liked it- it was sweet but then at the same time the outside seemed to be covered with the batter that you put on fried chicken (probably not quite the same thing as what you put on fried chicken but that is the only thing that I can use to describe it), I had Natalie try it too and she understood my description, she was not sure if she liked it either.
When we were done with our breakfast we ran back down to the bakery, for once I was one of the people that are riding their bikes down the street backwards!!! Though I did feel a little funny riding my bike for like 15 yards, but oh well. Like I have mentioned in the past, having a fresh bakery nearby is not a good idea for me, I went back and found another type of bread to try and some several other things that looked very, very yummy. While I was looking around trying to decide what I wanted to get Natalie started looking through the coolers and looking at the cakes that they, she thought about getting one for Grace as her birthday was on Friday but then in the end decided not to, though she did ask me which one was my favorite?
Next after the bakery came the yellow store where we needed to go and find some glue and balloons for our piñatas, we were able to find the glue but no balloons (but that is ok later last night Teacher Stephanie let me into the preschool and I was able to get some from the craft supplies closet). While we were at the yellow store Natalie and I kept on getting distracted very easily with things, but it was a lot of fun, though it was very good that neither she nor I had places to be as we probably were there for close to an hour just wandering round looking at things and making jokes about them. While we were at the yellow store Natalie told me about a dream that she had, had the night before- I guess that she and I were somewhere and we saw this snail, it was not any ordinary snail though it was big, black and fuzzy, oh and it could go really fast. Anyway I guess that I threw salt at the snail and it started to boil and fizz, and then it turned into a lamb or something like that, later I told her that I had not actually thrown salt at the snail I had actually thrown a pineapple at it. Which is kind of funny, as ever since she told me that story snails keep popping up, first of all last night when I was talking to Teacher Stephanie we saw one and I asked her if she had a pineapple (it was funny she was like “You want to cook it?”), I then of course had to tell her the story and then also tonight we found a snail on our lettuce and Natalie thought that it was cute and wanted to keep it as a pet (she has difficulty killing things- my first week I walked into the kitchen to find a jar on the kitchen table with a cockroach in it).
We finally came home and I first tried calling mommy, but sadly she did not answer her phone. I hadn’t talked with Nathan in awhile so I tried calling him, I found him and Sallee just leaving the state fair with Sallee’s parents and so they asked if I could call them back in a little while. While I waited to call them back I worked on my journal. It was nice to talk to them, I enjoy talking with Natalie, Teacher Stephanie, and Yuling but it is not quite the same and I enjoy very much when I get to talk to my friends and family. It was quite late for Nate and Sallee and they were getting up early to go canoeing and so we hung up, I went to work finishing the cleaning that I wanted to do- the only thing that I didn’t get to yesterday that I had wanted to was my laundry. I was thinking about it, last year we always complained about when we had cleaning checks and about having to do all that work, but as I have been here and have not really done any cleaning it has really disgusted me and I was happy to see my bathroom after I had done just some simple cleaning—thank you for RA’s for making us clean our room!
When I was done getting my cleaning done I decided that I would just lay down and relax for awhile reading my book, Natalie was also in the kitchen laying down on the couch reading a book so I decided to go and join her there. We hadn’t been reading for very long when all of a sudden it started to rain really hard. I ignored it at first but then I was like oh no and jumped up starting running around closing all the windows again, it hadn’t been very long but already just from one window there was rain on the ground probably 4 feet away from the window. It was kind of funny, as soon as Natalie realized what I was doing she also ran into her rooms to make sure that all the windows were closed, I was pretty sure that I hadn’t opened mine from the last rain storm but went into check anyway. As I walked past my bathroom I looked up above the window and pretty much scared myself, outside in the grates there were probably 6 birds all trying to be protected from the window, I also scared them and half of them flew away, I then walked into my room and in those grates there were at least 12 birds all sitting, I went to grab my camera but when I tried taking a picture they all flew away, I was able to get a picture with one bird but that does not even begin to show what it was like. I quickly went and got Natalie and had her come in my room and look, she went to check hers but she didn’t have any in her grates.
Natalie called Teacher Stephanie to find out when we would be going, I found out that we would be leaving in about an hour and so decided to go back to reading for awhile. When it was about 15 minutes till we were supposed to leave I went downstairs where Teacher Stephanie and Eliza were (Teacher Stephanie had tried to come and call Kevin’s mom but she was ignoring her phone call). When Natalie came downstairs we headed out, we were first going to Yuling’s house to pick up Allie (her niece) who would be going with us (because Yuling was stuck in the hospital we were getting to use her tickets and did not have to buy ours like we thought we were going to have to). After we had gotten Allie we headed out again, Teacher Stephanie asked us if we were hungry, we admitted that we were and she asked where would we like to go, she suggested McDonalds’ and we kind of jumped on it (of course Allie and Eliza were all for the idea :D). So now I have eaten at McDonalds in Taiwan, the price was about the same for a meal, I had a chicken sandwich with fries and a drink and it only cost about $100NT, though the ice cream was much cheaper, it was only $10NT and it tasted soooo good- exactly like American soft serve ice cream! Though it was funny, they put the ice cream into the cups and then put the cone on top of it and then they placed all of the ice creams in a bag, which was kind of nice so then we had time to eat our dinner first before the ice cream.
We arrived at the place where the performance was going to be. When we were walking up the stairs we saw May (6 year old, now that summer is over she no longer goes to Owl Preschool L), we were so happy to see her (she was one of our favorites), at first she was a little shy but then she soon opened up. As we were standing there waiting for Teacher Stephanie to get our tickets we also saw Mark (one of our new 5 year olds) walk up with his dad (it was kind of funny he had seen Natalie the night before on her bike with the two Sister Missionaries) and then we also saw Denica (a 7 year-used to go to Owl Preschool) and her brother Shawn (3 year old) come up with their mom. Shawn was not particularly too happy to see 3 of his teachers outside of school, he immediately started to cry, we felt so bad, every time we passed him we would cover our faces so that he would not see who we were. We had really awesome seats, Natalie and I were almost in the middle on the 4th row and then Teacher Stephanie with Allie and Eliza were on the 7th row. While we were sitting there Natalie and I were pretty sure that we saw this random lady taking our picture (we have noticed that it has started happening quite a bit), we thought about giving her a bad impression of us and start picking our noses or something but then we didn’t.
The show was really awesome, I tried explaining the show to Nathan and Sallee but could not very well, if you are interested in it I posted information about it 2 posts below. I was quite impressed with it and grateful that we could be there. Most of the audience was parents with their children (I am guessing that they went to a lot of schools to advertise), it made it that more fun to hear all the kids sitting around me laughing, a child’s laughter can make anything better than it already is. They obviously were quite good as they were able to keep probably close to 600 people (with the majority being children) enthralled for close to 2 hours. During the intermission it was so much fun, Natalie and I stood up and were stretching our legs, when all of a sudden we heard “TEACHER BETH, TEACHER NAT-A-LIE!!!!,” we looked around and saw different kids from different directions, some really high and some really close, all students waving at us (besides May, Mark, Denica, and Shawn we also saw Ray and Little Annie), it was so fun, if ever we stopped waving they would start waving again or their parents would. It made us feel so happy that the kids were that happy to see us out of school, even Shawn waved and smiled at us once he realized that his mom wasn’t going to leave him with us.
Once the show was over we went outside and they had some of the Diabolo’s or Chinese Yo-Yo’s for sale, they had these really cool ones that had flashing colors but I didn’t feel like spending $900NT for one, I did end up getting one of the cheapest ones, Teacher Stephanie said that they are professional ones so they are really nice. We went outside and stopped at some grass to try doing it, I of course could not get it, but Natalie was able to get it on her 3rd try, it is ok though, the toy belongs to me and so I will get plenty of practice..anyone want to try the Diabolo when I get home be sure and let me know.
When we had finished playing with the toy for awhile we headed home, first dropping off Allie. When I got home I was too tired to write my journal but I did finish my book and went to bed much, much earlier than I normally do.
I woke up for church this morning and quickly got ready for church, thankfully Teacher Stephanie had reminded us that it was fast Sunday (I had remembered last week but did not remember last night), and so I didn’t need to get any breakfast. When I was ready I called to Natalie and asked if she was ready to go (I doubted that she would be as she had only gotten up like 15 minutes before I like to leave for church, but I still thought that it would be polite to ask), she wasn’t and so I told her that I was headed off for church. When I got to the Relief Society room Ariel’s mom asked me if I had brought the CD
(in a couple of weeks we are singing the EFY medley in Relief Society and I had told them that I had the music, I was going to make them a copy. I had seen that there were some CD’s in my desk and so I had thought that I was ok, it wasn’t till last night when we got home that I checked them and found out that they were actually blank DVD’s.)
I explained to her what had happened, I felt really bad because I didn’t have it for today but I did take my laptop this morning and we just turned it up as loud as it could go and played it for the sisters. I will be sure and go to the store and get some blank CD’s tomorrow so that I can make them the CD. It was interesting practicing the song, when I have my music playing, loud as it can go seems really loud but when there is a bunch of sisters in a larger room it doesn’t sound very loud.
For Relief Society Sister Wood did not have her manual so it was harder for her to follow along, so none of really got much out of our lessons today. Though during Sunday School she started having Natalie and I just read different paragraphs out of the manual as the teacher was reading the paragraphs and then rephrasing them in a way that Sister Wood could not follow along with. As it was Fast Sunday today it was testimony meeting in Sacrament Meeting. There were many good testimonies given. Today also Baby Daniel was blessed (Yuling’s baby). They had let Yuling out for a couple of hours in order to let her come for the Daniel’s blessing. When it was time for testimonies Yuling stood up to bear hers, she started with explaining a little bit of what had been happening the last few days and about how grateful that she was to be there as they weren’t sure if she was going to be able to be there or if they were going to be able to have Daniel’s blessing today. She told of the lady who was in the bed beside her at the hospital, how she was much worse off than her- she had been there for 10 days already. Then Yuling talked a little bit about Allie and how grateful she was to have her, I guess that a sometime this week they had stopped by at 7-Eleven to get slurpees and Alli was like no we can’t go and get them, when asked why she said because all they have is Coco-Cola and that black stuff (coffee), when Yuling went it and found out she was right she felt so grateful that Alli had been listening in church and that she was trying to live the gospel standards and teachings. She also said that before they had found out what was wrong with her Alli had said a prayer to Heavenly Father to help bless Yuling that she would get well and be able to return home quickly. It was kind of funny, when Yuling had been talking for about 10 minutes the Branch President put a piece of paper up on the pulpit saying that she had been talking too long, rather than stop Yuling just flipped over the paper and continued talking for awhile longer- everyone thought that it was funny. So because of Yuling when the next lady came up to bear her testimony the 2nd counselor immediately gave her a piece of paper saying about how long a testimony should last.
When church was over Teacher Stephanie came over to me and asked if she could borrow my computer so that she and a few others could practice the song, I was like sure and went to hand it to her, than she was like but I don’t know how to use it so I would like to borrow you too! I thought that, that was funny, and of course I agreed and went downstairs back to the Relief Society room with her. We practiced the song probably close to 5 times, by the time I got home it was close to an hour after when church got over. I found out something, when you go home from church there are many more people to flash than when you go to church.
I came home and took a nap for a little over an hour, I was quite surprised, normally on Sunday afternoons I set my alarm and then when it goes off I turn it off and then go back to sleep for several more hours, today when my alarm went off I set it for another half an hour but when it went off I got straight up and started working on my journal.
We had invited the Sister Missionaries to dinner and they had agreed to come along with Amy. About 20 minutes after the Hualien branch got out Sister Hill called to tell us that they had been invited by the Relief Society President from the Hualien branch to dinner, the lady had acted as if it was already planned, the Sister Missionaries agreed to come and then called us to see if it that was ok and to say that they were sorry, we were sorry that we would be joined by them but it was ok we weren’t planning on having anything too special- just sandwiches (Natalie has been wanting to have them for several weeks now and finally I was like ok). We have planned that they will join us next week though for dinner (we had better do something special it is the moon festival). By the time that Amy showed up (2 hours after her branch got out), Natalie and I were very hungry but we did get a special treat, the Sister Missionaries came with her to see us for a little bit before their dinner appointment. We sang a hymn and then they gave us a message but then they had to be off.
Sometime since Natalie has been here she bought a package of lunch meat, it has been in the freezer so last night we pulled it out and put it in the fridge to let it defrost. For dinner we just had simple sandwiches, but they tasted oh so yummy. It was kind of fun with Natalie and Amy, but I guess because I don’t really know Amy that well and I wasn’t here during her conversion to have that bond with her I kind of feel like a 3rd wheel, I hope that it gets better as time goes on.
Once dinner was over I came to my room to finish my journal and work on my lesson plans for the week, I am quite happy to say that it is only 10:30 and I already have my lesson plans done for the week except the afternoon class because I need to talk with Natalie about that, and then once I am done with this I will do my evaluations! When I don’t sleep as late in the afternoon I get so much more done, hopefully I will be able to keep continue not sleeping as late.
I guess that I am done with today! Wow, I can’t believe that I am on my 6th page! I love you all and hope that you are having a wonderful Sabbath, I am now off to work on my evaluations. ~Betherd~
No comments:
Post a Comment